World of Warcraft Expansion Details Leaked

JavaLord writes "The new expansion to World of Warcraft titled "Wrath of the Lich King" recently went into friends and family alpha testing. Some of the first screenshots, along with notes on new spells have been leaked on the world of warcraft forums and other websites only to be pulled down. As usual, the internet routes around censorship, and the low down on Wrath of the Lich King can be found here."

Sadly enough...

if that page is any indication of what will be coming with WotLK, there will be quite a few upset customers.

them and that dreaded line 163!

damn you world of warcraft

i want my fiancee back

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If you truly cared about your fiancee, you'd join her guild.

Fakkkkkkeeeeeee

A few of the notes maybe real. Several are fake.

The biggest issue is the maps are known fakes circulated for the last 6 months. Maps have been historically one of the last items finished. I beta tested the burning crusade, Maps were added in one of the last beta patches, especially the map for outlands.

Not to mention they have melee talents for a magic class...

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The warlocks talents seem to be a dead giveaway that those talents are fake. I don't think Blizzard would ever consider putting a "demon form" tanking talent in a magic dps class. It's just something the developers have explicitly said they will never, ever do because "that ruined Everquest".

Blizzard's developers are terribly afraid of magic classes being able to dps and tank at the same time.

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It's not a tanking talent though. A 360% buff on armor is much less than the druid's 450% increase, and they wear cloth which is generally 50% less armor than leather. It looks like a solo/pvp talent to me.

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Well considering Age of Conan is due to be released today I think (or tomorrow?) I would be expecting some well timed "leaks" from Blizzard.

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It's not a Blizzard leak. Blizzard would post this on their site like they did for TBC.

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You start the game at level 55? Yea right.

The Death Knight is a Hero Class -- available to anyone with a character over level 55, starting at level 55. See also Gamespot's preview [gamespot.com]

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Funny how you wouldn't believe the only real piece of information.

Take all this info with a grain of salt...

Almost all this info is coming from MMOwned Forum [mmowned.com] from what I've seen. Almost all of it is from data mining the data files, so it is no real indication of what is really active in the game. Many times, spells and items are in the data files that are never really included, this is even more true for WotLK.

The screenshots and models are probably near final versions, but spells and the like are questionable.

WoWWiki - Wrath of the Lich King

Probably one of the easiest places to get info about the upcoming expansion is WoWWiki's Wrath of the Lich King page [wowwiki.com].

Since I'm not in the alpha testing, I can't comment to the veracity of what is on WoWWiki's site, but the editors over there seem to be fairly good.

More new numbers that compute to the same answer

Great. Another expansion that adds "more of the same" to an already tired genre.

The nature of MMOs is that an expansion can't REALLY add anything that's very different than everything else in the game. This is because of that magical word "Balance"

Power gamers play these games and figure out what is the "best" of everything, and exploit that knowledge to be the "best" in the game. This means that everything new added to the game cannot deviate to far from the existing paradigms, such as damage-ove

Re:More new numbers that compute to the same answe

Not totally true. One of the nicest thing about FFXI's expansions is that on top of a number of hours of more storyline, almost every one of them has added totally new things that where never in the game before ToAU added instance battles, chocobo breeding and racing, a Pokemon type game to play between players, and city attacks. WotG added a whole new battlesystem in the past that involves campaigns against enemy armys without the need to be in a massive alliance. This also changed the whole nature of XP

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Never did, but there is no need. They just lowered the port level for outposts in those regions, but even at that it was totally unneeded. Of course these days you a idiot if your leveling there in a party as there are so many better and faster solo ways to go.

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Actually, it's a programming thing. The computer science thing is the same as the math thing, the little corner thingy. Computer science and programming are not quite the same thing.

Re:More new numbers that compute to the same answe

Great. Another expansion that adds "more of the same" to an already tired genre.

10 million subscribers are a tired genre? Sure.

The nature of MMOs is that an expansion can't REALLY add anything that's very different than everything else in the game. This is because of that magical word "Balance"

You obviously haven't played pre Burning Crusade WoW. Plenty of changes were introduced from vanilla WoW to TBC that weren't just more of the same, for example, gear progression was made way more diverse instead of the old raid or STFU paradigm.

TBC introduced:
- Gear progression for solo play (crafting, PvP). You can finally craft powerful items.
- Competitive PvP that doesn't require you to stop living and play 28h a day and it's based mostly on skill (I am perfectly aware that is not perfect). Arena system.
- Heroic dungeons with their own gear progression.
- Completely eliminated the trinity of warrior + priest + mage. It's not perfect but all classes have various abilities that are wanted in the game, it's no more let's wait for the protection warrior to log on so we can do something.
- Socket system.

Stuff TBC will introduce:
- Death Knight class, with its own unique game mechanics: not mana, not rage, not energy. Something unique.
- The 25 man raids will have a 10 man version. So you won't have to run the same Karhazan instance until your eyes bleed. Variety. Options. Something they started with TBC, to allow everyone to experience every facet and story of the game.
- Brand new crafting profession. Again, different than the flock we have now.
- Some other stuff we are unaware of.

Power gamers play these games and figure out what is the "best" of everything, and exploit that knowledge to be the "best" in the game. This means that everything new added to the game cannot deviate to far from the existing paradigms, such as damage-over-time, healing-per-mana-point, etc etc

I wonder why the FIFA doesn't sanction head butts a la Zidane since that would add 'diversity' and 'deviate' from current football rules. Oh wait ... maybe because football is about kicking a ball and not head butting your opponent in the chest? Same way WoW is about casting spells and using offensive melee abilities. If you want to play a sci-fi MMOG go play Eve Online. If you want to play an FPS go play Quake. WoW is a medieval fantasy setting game, you can't really deviate from its core rules. You can't add a B-52 bomber to the game because it would make no sense.

When people buy these expansions they are really just paying for additional artwork of the new monsters.

And when you buy the new music CD from your favorite band you are just buying 'additional' notes and artwork right? How about books? Just additional words?

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You can't add a B-52 bomber to the game because it would make no sense.

Tell that to the Draenei, I think they are still steamed over the Blood Elves stealing their precious space ship...

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I harbor a deep and impenetrable sadness due to the fact that I realize I will most likely be playing WoW again once WotLK is released.

Deep. And Impenetrable.

Re:More new numbers that compute to the same answe

If you already hate MMOs, why bother posting. Personally, I thought the Burning Crusade expansion actually improved a lot on the original game experience. Quests were more interesting, there was more to do, and they had some neat ideas.

As far as the other garbage you spew, even if they change significantly (and they actually did past 60), people will just do the math and figure out how things have changed. So they are free to deviate as much as they want and balance in the future if necessary.

When p

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well, im gaming since 1982 when i was 7. you develop an immunity after a while.

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no quests.. Blizzard said quests ruin the game exp.

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While I agree, I also understand why Blizzard did what they did. They worked on developing free content for their existing expansion instead of devoting 100% of their resources on a new one. If you look at what's been added since the TBC release, a pretty significant amount of content has been added.

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Wait, there's MMO's that take paid for expansions?...

Gotta love a MMOPRG

where they display in their opening screenshot
http://www.armada-online.com/screenshots/screenshots.html [armada-online.com]

someone referring to someone else as a NOOB